276 NIGHT-HAWK. 



season, they plunge through the air, but the rusthng sound of their wings 

 at this or any other time after the love season is less remarkable. 



In the Middle States, about the 20th of May, the Night-Hawk, with- 

 out much care as to situation, deposits its two, almost oval, freckled eggs, 

 on the bare ground, or on an elevated spot in the ploughed fields, or even 

 on the naked rock, sometimes in barren or open places in the skirts of the 

 woods, never entering their depths. No nest is ever constructed, nor is 

 the least preparation made by scooping the ground. They never, I be- 

 Heve, raise more than one brood in a season. The young are for some 

 time covered with a soft down, the colour of which, being a dusky brown, 

 greatly contributes to their safety. Should the female be disturbed du- 

 ring incubation, she makes her escape, pretending lameness, fluttering 

 and trembhng, until she feels assured that you have lost sight of her eggs 

 or young, after which she flies off, and does not return until you have 

 withdrawn, but she will suffer you to approach her, if unseen, until with- 

 in a foot or two of her eggs. During incubation, the male and female 

 sit alternately. After the young are tolerably grown, and require less 

 warmth from their parents, the latter are generally found in their imme- 

 diate neighbourhood, quietly squatted on some fence, rail, or tree, where 

 they remain so very silent and motionless that it is no easy matter to dis- 

 cover them. 



When wounded they scramble off very awkwardly, and if taken in 

 the hand immediately open their mouth to its full extent repeatedly, as 

 if the mandibles moved on hinges worked by a spring. They also strike 

 with their wings in the manner of pigeons, but without any effect. 



The food of the Night-Hawk consists entirely of insects, especially 

 those of the Coleopterous order, although they also seize on moths and 

 caterpillars, and are very expert at catching crickets and grasshoppers, 

 with which they sometimes gorge themselves, as they fly low over the 

 ground with great rapidity. They now and then drink whilst flying 

 closely over the water, in the manner of swallows. 



None of these birds remain during the winter in any portion of the 

 United States. The Chuck-wiUVwidow alone have I heard, and found 

 far up the St John's River, in East Florida, in January. Frequently 

 during autumn, at New Orleans, I have known some of these birds to re- 

 main searching for food over the meadows and river until the rainy sea- 

 son had begun, and then is the time at which the sportsmen shoot many 

 of them down ; but the very next day, if the weather was still drizzly. 



